[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Got a feeling that “environmentalist” will find any number of reasons to object.

[shove_it]

ping

[Young Werther]

Senator Harrison Schmitt the Apollo 17 astronaut and a geologist has recommended returning to the moon and mining the Helium 3 that is found there. It would be the fuel for fusion reactors which could be based on the moon or in Earth geosynchronus orbit. The electricity genrated would be beamed to Earth just like the SPSs!

Ad Astra Y'all!

[Sender]

Once collected, the solar energy would be safely beamed to Earth via wireless radio transmission

Heh. To be worth building, such an expensive net of solar satellites would have to provide gigawatts of energy, which would require orbiting gigawatt radio transmitters, and they want to "safely" beam gigawatts of energy down to Earth and somehow collect all that and convert it to 60Hz. Nikola Tesla will be impressed if they can pull that off.

We already have people claiming they are being harmed by RFID and who shield themselves from power lines. Imagine living under one of these satellites. I smell enviro-lawsuit. Plus, hey, you're blocking my sun!

[Lokibob]

Google keyword “ helium-3 “ to see the worlds next power source.

He-3, abundant on the moon, an estimated one ton would power the entire U.S. for a year. The fusion technology only needs to be developed, and it is actively be studied. That is fusion, NOT fission.

Amazing that President Bush, AN OIL MAN, would authorize a permanent presence on the moon in the next few years (unless he knows something the rest of us do not ).

.....Bob

[Izzy Dunne]

safely beamed to Earth via wireless radio transmission,

What happens to the plane (and the people in it) that flies through that beam?

[Vaduz]

Buck Rogers thinks do not want.

[Sender]

I propose a more efficient solution: EDBOEC, energy delivery via big, orange extension cords. If we spin them up just right, centrifugal force should keep them tight and we'll know the satellites are in proper orbit.

Please, PLEASE don't unplug the big orange cords, It's not funny anymore, really it's not.

[RU88]

With this new found power maybe we could create a laser beam from space that incinerates the brand new New York Times building.

[STONEWALLS]

....solar power has been around for a generation now...right here on earth....if it was so good and so cheap the free market would have cashed in by now....every new house in Phoenix would have a roof top unit built right in.

[thackney]

solar energy would be safely beamed to Earth via wireless radio transmission...

Change that to read:

And then a miraculous jump in technology happens...

[CPOSharky]

Once collected, the solar energy would be safely beamed to Earth via wireless radio transmission, where it would be received by antennas near cities and other places where large amounts of power are used.

Collect and beam to Earth via radio. ("wireless radio" is redundant) So, we can now modulate radio waves with sun energy? How does that work?

(A lot of) Government scientists = "What do you want to me to prove today?

[ExGeeEye]

Great Scott!

[Brett66]

Solar Power Satellites can find niche applications in space, maybe beaming power to a future moon base, but it’s highly unlikely they’ll ever be competitive with a simple coal or nuclear plant.

Even if we did build these, we still need a viable method to power cars.

[Uncledave]

Renewable Energy Ping

Please Freep Mail me if you'd like on/off

[NuclearDruid]

The OpEd is nothing more than a rehash of this month's Scientific American article on a Japanese program that's been going on now for a decade. The little NASA bureau-slaves have slide rule envy and are whining for more as they wallow in the public’s feed trough.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=farming-solar-energy-in-space

The US is now a firmly entrenched service-based economy. We don't need to do the skull work that something of this magnitude would require. Let the Japanese carry the water. If it works, great! I'm sure their worker-drones will happily be exploited by this new industry the same way their auto workers, shipyard workers, and consumer electronics workers have been.

Worse case, they succeed and build a transmission line across the Bering Sea so that we end up sending our energy dollars to Asia instead of the Arabs. Who really cares. Either way, our publically schooled Luddites without opposable thumbs will still be able to hunt & peck the controls on their MP3 players and Blackberries.

It's all good.

[autumnraine]

And another nation could “shoot” our energy supply right out of existence. Better have a back up plan.

[Cable225]

Isaac Asimov wrote "The Last Question", a short sci-fi story on this very assumption over fifty years ago.

Clearly, all we need is Multivac to figure out the logistics for us.

[RightWhale]

30 years ago, during the Arab oil embargo, this was widely discussed. Cheap oil shot it down, and Enviros cheered. Actually space industry would be the first application and no power would need to be beamed to earth.

[Centurion2000]

I have a better idea. We build a BOATLOAD of fission reactors, reprocess all the spent fuel, encase the low level nuclear waste in glass, drop that into the Mariannas trench. Take all that high level waste and shoot it into a decaying solar orbit with a rocket fueled by all that oil we just saved.

Problems solved and no gigawatt masers needed.

Besides, did these idiots even consider what an ultra high powered maser would do to the atmosphere and weather patterns? Permanent high pressure zone anyone?